The cryptic Vampire Survivors hint that unlocks Toastie. Defeat a green or blue reaper, then mash Down + Enter during the half-second pop-up.
tramezzini"Uppercut a non-red reaper" is the second hint in the Vampire Survivors Secrets menu. The hint is a Mortal Kombat reference, not a literal in-game action. Players cannot perform an actual uppercut move because Vampire Survivors is an auto-attack roguelite with no manual combat inputs.
The clue is pointing at a hidden Easter egg. After you defeat a non-red reaper enemy, Toastie appears in the bottom-right corner of the screen for half a second. Pressing the Down Arrow and Enter keys at the same time during that window unlocks Toastie as a secret playable character.
The Mortal Kombat connection runs through the whole sequence. Toastie's name is a direct reference to Mortal Kombat sound designer Dan Forden, who appears in the corner of the screen and yells "Toasty!" whenever a player lands an uppercut in the original arcade games.
The cryptic input combination (Down Arrow plus Enter during a brief on-screen flash) is also a Mortal Kombat homage. In Mortal Kombat II, players unlocked the hidden character Smoke by performing a similarly cryptic input sequence on a specific stage.
Unlock Exdash Exiviiq first. The fastest way is casting x-x1viiq in the main menu. Toastie cannot be unlocked until Exdash is on the roster.
Exdash Exiviiq is the gatekeeping character. The Toastie unlock check runs server-side after every non-red reaper kill, but it only fires for players who already have Exdash unlocked.
There are two ways to unlock Exdash:
x-x1viiq directly. The unlock posts immediately. This is faster and works on all platforms.
Little Clover method. Collect Little Clovers in any run until Exdash unlocks randomly. This is slower and entirely RNG-dependent.Older wiki revisions claimed that unlocking Exdash via the Little Clover method blocked the Toastie unlock entirely. Multiple players have since confirmed in Steam threads that this is false. Toastie unlocks correctly through either Exdash path.
If you read an older guide that warned against the clover method, you can ignore it.
The Stalker (green reaper), The Drowner (blue reaper), and The Trickster all count. The standard red Reaper that spawns at 30:00 in every stage does not count.
Vampire Survivors has multiple reaper-class enemies. The unlock specifically excludes the standard red Reaper, which is the boss that spawns at the 30:00 mark in every stage as a hard run-ender.
The non-red reapers each have their own colour palette and stage assignments. The full list is below.
| Reaper | Colour | Spawn Stages | Counts For Toastie |
|---|---|---|---|
 The Reaper | Red | Every stage at 30:00 | No |
 The Stalker | Green | Dairy Plant, The Bone Zone | Yes |
 The Drowner | Blue | Gallo Tower, The Bone Zone | Yes |
 The Trickster | Purple | Cappella Magna at 5:00 | Yes |
The Stalker and Drowner are the two reapers most players target. The Trickster spawn requires reaching Cappella Magna and surviving to the 5:00 mark, which is more setup than the alternatives.
Run The Bone Zone with any character. A green reaper spawns at minute 10 and a blue reaper appears later. Kill them with Victory Sword or Gorgeous Moon, then mash Down + Enter for the entire kill window.
The Bone Zone is the most reliable farm location. Both The Stalker and The Drowner are guaranteed spawns rather than chance encounters.
x-x1viiq in the main menu if not.
Victory Sword or 
Gorgeous Moon. Both deal massive damage and reliably finish the green reaper at minute 10.The S key (down in the WASD configuration) does NOT count as Down for this unlock. The check only accepts the actual Down Arrow key. Switch from WASD to arrow keys before attempting, or use a controller D-Pad.
Dairy Plant has a chance to spawn The Stalker at 0:00, 8:00, and 12:00. Gallo Tower can spawn The Drowner alongside the Giant Crab at 25:00. Cappella Magna spawns The Trickster at 5:00.
Dairy Plant has a chance to spawn The Stalker at minutes 0:00, 8:00, and 12:00. The chance is not 100%, so a single run may produce zero spawns.
Important counter-intuitive note from the Steam community: high Luck stat actually reduces the chance of Stalker spawning on Dairy Plant. Players hunting for him should disable Luck PowerUps in the main menu before starting the run.
Once the Stalker appears, the easiest kill method is to lure him onto one of the mine carts that traverse the level. The mine cart deals enough damage to one-shot him without requiring a built-up weapon.
Patience matters on Dairy Plant. The 0:00 spawn is the rarest, the 8:00 and 12:00 windows are more reliable. Multiple runs may be needed if RNG is unkind. A common community strategy is to immediately quit and reload if no Stalker appears at 0:00, since waiting for the 8:00 window with a low-level character risks dying before the spawn check fires.
For players who own the Tides of the Foscari DLC, the Eleanor character's starting kit pairs particularly well with this farm. Her Glass Fandango inflicts immediate high damage with no Luck dependency, which keeps the Stalker spawn check uncorrupted.
The Drowner can spawn alongside the Giant Crab at the 25:00 mark on Gallo Tower. Gorgeous Moon or a maxed Rosary will dispatch him quickly.
This method requires surviving past 25:00 with enough damage to handle both the Drowner and the Giant Crab simultaneously. It works but requires more setup than the Bone Zone path.
The Trickster appears on Cappella Magna at the 5:00 mark. The map has Rosary pickups scattered around it, which provide guaranteed instant kills on any non-boss enemy in range.
The Cappella Magna method has a quirk: once you defeat one Trickster while Exdash is unlocked but Toastie is not, the spawn rate drops dramatically on subsequent runs. Some players report not seeing further Trickster spawns after a missed input attempt.
Cast tramezzini in the Forbidden Scrolls of Morbane menu to unlock Toastie instantly. Exdash must already be unlocked. The achievement still does not register on the spell path.
Forbidden Scrolls ShortcutCasting tramezzini in the Forbidden Scrolls of Morbane menu unlocks Toastie immediately. The 1,000-coin character purchase still applies once the unlock posts.
The tradeoff: the Toastie achievement that the kill-input path grants does not register, and the Mortal Kombat Easter egg sequence is skipped entirely.
Tramezzini is Italian for a triangular sandwich, fitting Toastie's sandwich-themed name (and code-name "PANINI"). The naming is consistent with how poncle has assigned other Italian-themed character spell codes throughout the game.
Tramezzini was added in a later patch as an accessibility option, after community feedback that the half-second input window was punishingly tight on certain platforms. The spell is the official intended workaround for players who cannot land the timing.
Toastie starts with Peachone (evolves into Vandalier with Ebony Wings). Stats favour Might and Cooldown but include heavy negatives like -50% Speed and -10% Max Health.
Toastie is the Mortal Kombat unlock reward. He becomes purchasable at 777 coins, his code-name is PANINI, and his starting weapon is 
Peachone.
Peachone evolves into Vandalier when paired with Ebony Wings, which is one of the strongest weapon evolutions in the base game. Vandalier covers the entire screen with high-damage projectiles.
| Attribute | Value |
|---|---|
| Cost to Purchase | 777 coins |
| Starting Weapon | Peachone (evolves to Vandalier with Ebony Wings) |
| Code Name | PANINI |
| Might | +20% |
| Max Health | -99 |
| Speed | -50% |
| Area | +10% |
| Cooldown | -10% |
| Magnet | +100% |
| Greed | -10% |
Toastie's -99 Max Health is the headline weakness. He starts with effectively 1 HP and dies to any incidental contact damage. Survival requires immediate Armor stacking through 
Revival, 
Awake (IV), and 
Tirajisu.
The maxed-out Awake combo gives +1 Armor from Revival, +3 from Awake (IV) at level 200, and +2 from Tirajisu. Total +6 Armor lets a level-200 Toastie survive even direct Reaper hits at 1 damage per tick.
Divine Bloodline (IX) Arcana is the strongest first-pick. Retaliatory damage on every contact lets Toastie tank his way through the early game while building Max Health from kills, which compensates for the -99 starting penalty.
An early 
Paranormal Scan from a chest can also help acquire the last required points of Armor without hogging a valuable Arcana slot. Players running Toastie for the first time should prioritise Growth-boosting passives early so the level-200 Armor cap arrives faster.
The +100% Magnet stat is genuinely useful in the late game. Combined with 
Crown and 
Clover pickups, Toastie clears XP gems from the entire screen without breaking position. This compensates for the -50% Speed penalty by making positioning less critical once a build comes online.
Toastie is named after Dan Forden, the Mortal Kombat sound designer who pops up in the corner yelling "Toasty!" after uppercuts. The Down + Enter input is a Mortal Kombat II Smoke unlock reference.
The Toastie Easter egg is one of the deepest pop-culture references in Vampire Survivors. The full sequence chains together two distinct Mortal Kombat callbacks.
The first callback is the "Toasty!" pop-up itself. In Mortal Kombat II (1993) and several later entries, sound designer Dan Forden filmed himself reacting to a particularly brutal uppercut. His face appears in the bottom-right corner of the screen for a brief flash, accompanied by him yelling the word "Toasty!" The Vampire Survivors Toastie appears in exactly that same screen position, for the same brief duration.
The second callback is the cryptic input combo. Mortal Kombat II hid a secret character named Smoke who could be unlocked by performing an obscure sequence on a specific background stage. The Vampire Survivors version mirrors that with the Down Arrow + Enter timing during the Toastie pop-up window.
The "uppercut" framing in the Secrets menu hint completes the metaphor. Vampire Survivors does not have an uppercut move, but the player's relationship to a non-red reaper kill is structurally identical: deal a finishing blow, watch the corner pop-up appear, react fast.
The Mortal Kombat connection runs even deeper for fans of the original arcade games. Dan Forden has been Mortal Kombat's primary sound designer since the first game in 1992, and the "Toasty!" pop-up debuted in Mortal Kombat II as an inside joke between the development team. Forden filmed the segment in a single take during a late-night session at Midway Games.
The pop-up itself triggers on roughly a 1-in-6 chance after any uppercut that connects, which mirrors the random Toastie spawn behaviour in Vampire Survivors. The half-second window matches the original arcade timing almost exactly. Players familiar with both games tend to spot the reference immediately, which is poncle's entire intent.
The cryptic Smoke unlock from Mortal Kombat II adds another layer to the homage. Smoke could only be unlocked by performing an obscure D-pad input on a specific arcade machine background stage, with no in-game hint. Vampire Survivors' Toastie unlock recreates that exact feeling of obscure ritualised input, then provides a backup spell as a courtesy that the original arcade game never offered.
| Date | Change |
|---|---|
| 2022 (early access) | Toastie added to game with the Mortal Kombat Easter egg unlock and the Secrets menu hint "2) Uppercut a non-red reaper." |
| Later 2022 patch | tramezzini spell added to Forbidden Scrolls of Morbane as an alternative unlock path for players who cannot land the input timing. |
| Later patches | Toastie spawn behaviour updated to closer match the original arcade Toasty pop-up engine, and to ensure it is properly hidden when leaving gameplay. |
Uppercut a non-red reaper is a cryptic Mortal Kombat reference, not a literal action. The hint tells players to defeat a non-red reaper enemy (The Stalker, The Drowner, or The Trickster), then press Down Arrow + Enter when the Toastie sprite appears in the bottom-right corner of the screen for half a second.
First unlock Exdash Exiviiq. Then run The Bone Zone with any character, build toward Victory Sword or Gorgeous Moon, and kill the green reaper that spawns at minute 10. Hold Down Arrow and spam Enter during the kill to catch the half-second Toastie pop-up.
The green reaper (The Stalker) dies to any high-damage finisher. Victory Sword, Gorgeous Moon, Pentagram, or a maxed Rosary all work. On Dairy Plant, players can also lure The Stalker onto a mine cart for a guaranteed one-shot.
The Stalker (green), The Drowner (blue), and The Trickster (purple) are the three non-red reapers. The standard red Reaper that spawns at minute 30 in every stage does not count for the Toastie unlock.
Two common causes. First, Exdash Exiviiq must be unlocked before the Toastie pop-up will trigger. Second, Boss Rash mode reapers do not count. The kill must happen in a normal stage run.
Yes, but with a different input. On Switch and Xbox, press Down on the D-Pad + A. On PlayStation, press Down on the D-Pad + X. The S key on a WASD keyboard configuration does not count, only the actual Down Arrow key works.
The spell is tramezzini, cast in the Forbidden Scrolls of Morbane menu. Exdash must be unlocked first. The spell unlocks Toastie immediately, but the achievement tied to the input timing does not register on the spell path.
The Stalker spawn check on Dairy Plant uses an inverse Luck calculation. Higher Luck reduces the spawn chance rather than increasing it. Players hunting for The Stalker should disable all main-menu Luck PowerUp upgrades before starting the run.
Toastie unlock mechanics, Exdash prerequisite chain, and Mortal Kombat reference details pulled from the official Vampire Survivors Wiki on Weirdgloop. Reaper spawn data cross-referenced with Castlevania Wiki and verified against Steam community threads from 2022 to 2024.
The Luck-reduces-Stalker-spawn quirk and the WASD key restriction were both reported by multiple Steam community members and confirmed against the Weirdgloop wiki revision history.
Sprite assets and stat data derived from the Vampire Survivors Wiki, hosted by Weirdgloop and licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 3.0. Vampire Survivors is a trademark of poncle. Mortal Kombat is a trademark of Warner Bros. Games. This guide is an independent reference and is not affiliated with poncle or Warner Bros.